Thanks for your close readings, Schnurrbrat. To take your last first, practically the only thing English uses amphybrach for is:

There was a young girl from Samoa
Who determined that no one should know her.
One young fellow tried
But she wriggled aside
And spilled all the spermatazoa.

But there's Leonard Cohen, as you say, and try Browning's "How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix," where he uses the amphybrach for speed. It begins:

I sprang to the saddle and Jorris and he
I galloped, Dirk galloped, we galloped all three.

Yes, you can omit the "to be" verb in English poetry (they also drop "esse" all the time in Latin poetry and all the Romance languages derived from it). We understand the tense of "artless the voice that he raised" and "unreplaceable stand" from the main verbs "raised" and "stand." Jesus, man, Russian doesn't even HAVE a verb "to be" in the continuous tense unless you count есть. I need serious lessons in how to use THAT.

I think contractions in English almost always sound informal, so in achieving a conversational effect they are fine. The exception is modifying verbs to gain or lose a syllable, as I did in 'gainst. You will see " 'dst " as a contracted past tense all the time in people like Milton. But to find "we've" or "I'll" you need a more intimate poet like Emily Dickinson.

You are right about articles as the sworn enemy of dactylic rhythm and the best friend of iambic. But English is an iambic language. I would say 80% of English verse is written in iambs, and 80% of that 80% in iambic pentameter. No rules or generalizations that I can think of about when it is ok to drop an article. Dan

I have a question too. Each language has its own deep mannerisms that are carried over to a person's secondary languages without their knowing it, even if everything else is fluent and meticulous and idiomatic. They say they found German spies in WWII by asking them to say "post office." The glottal stop between "t" and "o" gave them away. I certainly pick out slavs by their not quite spot on use and non-use of English articles. So, what is the English mannerism or deep-seated verbal need that gives us away to a Russian native speaker, no matter our fluency and spot-on accent otherwise? Dan

Probably right that just getting the accent is formidable. But how about in writing?

BTW you included an instance of what you were asking about when you wrote "sound similarly." Correct is "sound similar," because "sound" takes the predicate adjective "similar." You wouldn't say "you sound beautifully" if you meant that from the sound of her voice she sounded like a beautiful girl.

You shouldn't say "dropped the articles," you should say "dropped articles." I am curious about "what" not "how" translators sound like. "chit chatting in THE office," and "well, at least my Russian is in great form (NO "THE")." It makes no earthy sense.

The one thing I can do in Russian pretty well is read poetry. I was indoctrinated in чтение с пафосом by an old school, pre-war Russian.

очень хотел бы посмотреть на то что кончено Д